Bikepacking Trans Germany (BTG): Pt 1

The pre race BBQ and briefing was a low key affair at a swimming pool just outside Basel. Riders dribbled in from around Europe and further afield. Trackers and race numbers were handed out and there was a short and simple briefing by Achim, he didn’t seem too comfortable talking to a crowd, but that is logical as the BTG has gone in 3 years from an event with 16 starters to almost 70.

The BBQ was a great time to meet other riders, talk tactics and check out other peoples gear. Ironically a lot of chatter was not about the over priced carbon gravel bikes but Rolf’s + another riders choice to turn up on Singlespeed. Given the more than 20,000 vertical meters of the BTG this was an interesting choice. I figured if Rolf had decided to try this on a singlespeed he probably knew what he was doing (though his skinny legs could lead people to think he wasn’t a strong rider). When I spoke to Rolf during day 1 it was obvious that he knew what he was doing and I half expected him to be faster than me.

Sam and Sander (NL) looked a little intimidated by all the light set ups and mentioned that they may not have made the right choices in gear. I said not to worry about it, every one was turning up with their own goals, from the semi professional racing snakes with plans of finishing in 5-6 days on little to no sleep to the tourers like themselves that would take up to 3 weeks, and myself somewhere in the middle. “Ride your own ride, enjoy your Summer holiday”.

I also spoke to a nice Welshman that evening that didn’t turn up at the start the next day. He’d been having problems getting the route file onto his gps, so already implied he might just do another route, it seems a waste to travel all the way to Basel for a race then do something else? Thats the sad irony of these “self supported” endurance races. Not only do you need to be reasonably fit, know something about camping and bike repair, but you also need to be a half IT nerd to use a gps. The next morning when I asked around about him, there didn’t seem to be much sympathy for the fact he turned up un-prepared. I felt a little sorry for him but quickly put it behind my, I had enough to worry about myself.

At around 9pm and after too many beers with Sander (NL), Michal (PL), Lukas (DE), Tim (NL), Andreas (DE) and others I headed back to my hotel in Basel, I thought a good night of sleep in a hotel would be smarter than a busy night at a campsite. I decided to avoid this lot at the end of day one, the chance of it becoming a booze cruise was too high :), for the first time ever, I was here to race and not to tour.

At the start line Tim and I speculated about how many people would finish, we guessed that about 25-30% would scratch. There are many reasons to DNF, whether it be illness, mechanicals, lack of fitness or preparation or just bad luck. It seemed to me that many riders had very ambitious plans of finishing in 8,9,10,11 days which is fine, but most also had no reserve if something went wrong. “If I’m not done in 9 days I need to scratch and go back to work”. Though I understand that some people don’t have much time or need pressure/a deadline, this didn’t make sense to me. But, each to their own I guess. I also had a theory that many had underestimated the BTG, but that was just a theory, time would tell.

In March I made the prediction : For the Bike packing trans Germany I’ve made a plan that will see me at the finish at around 16 days. Should the planets align, winds be favourable, the pubs all be closed and my v5 training plan work, just maybe I can shave 2-4 days off that and finish somewhere in the middle of the field (the race record is 6.5 days).

Now at the start line and feeling good despite an MTB crash four weeks earlier and a light hangover I was fairly confident that if all went well I could finish around 12 days, and therefore had plenty of time in reserve if it didn’t go well. Anything faster would be a huge bonus, though seemed almost impossible. Anything under 10 days was far out of my league. Finishing in the top 30 was my aim and my new plan looked like this:

And they’re off: 8am July 1st 2018 the BTG circus left town. 62 riders were on the move.